The importance of a good headlight bulb - HID/Xenon bulbs
Posted: Thu Jan 21, 2016 5:33 pmHey all!
This is sort of a mini review (pun intended) of some of the HID/Xenon bulbs I've had on my R56. But also sort of a warning about how important your lights are.
I love the Mini's I've had but they have all had one major issue. The lights. They've all been crap. Having the HID/Xenon headlights are an improvement over the Halogen bulb units, but not really all that much. Which is why I added spot lights.
Spotlights only help when you can have your full beam on though.
So a while back I swapped the standard HID bulbs that were in my R56 to some new ones, which I thought would be better.
But first about the standard bulb: For mine they were a Philips XenStart, that have an approximate 4200k in the colour spectrum (e.g. a whitish yellow). The light output on them was not very good and didn't light up much of the side of the road either. This could be because the bulbs haven't been changed before or could have been changed by the previous owner with counterfeit bulbs (which is apparently quite a high chance with Philips bulbs bought on places like ebay).
The second set of bulbs I bought, the ones I thought would be an upgrade from all the info read about them, are MTEC units. After re-checking their details they are actually only OEM spec and it's only the "burners" that were an upgrade.
They are a 6000k in the light spectrum (very white, almost blue colour). While the colour of the light was nicer than the Philips bulbs, I don't think they actually produced any more light. When driving without other cars on the road they seemed fine, but when other cars are on the road it would look like they had switched off. You couldn't see the road at all.
Recently I found out that Osram has brought out an HID bulb for their Night Breaker line. Which if you know anything about halogen bulbs are considered to be some of the best on the market. So I thought I'd give them a go.
When I first turned these on, I thought I had accidentally put the full beam on, they were so bright.
I don't usually believe the crap manufactures put on their packaging, but I feel they actually produce more than the "up to 70% more light". They even light up quite a bit of the left side of the road too, so you can actually see where the side of the road is, even without putting full beam on.
I don't know what the colour rating is, as there doesn't appear to be any documentation on their K rating, but it is a yellow light, but slightly more white than the Philips bulb.
In conclusion: If you've got the HID/Xenon headlights, I highly recommend getting the Osram's. They are making my night time driving much safer.
(sorry I don't have pictures to compare the amount of light they all produce, but I cannot bring myself to change the bulbs three more times to get the pictures, in the dark. As I already installed the Orsam before I took pictures of them you can't have pictures of the bulbs either, just the box
)
P.S. People that drive with their fog lights on, when it's not foggy should be forced to try and sleep with a fog light in their face.
This is sort of a mini review (pun intended) of some of the HID/Xenon bulbs I've had on my R56. But also sort of a warning about how important your lights are.
I love the Mini's I've had but they have all had one major issue. The lights. They've all been crap. Having the HID/Xenon headlights are an improvement over the Halogen bulb units, but not really all that much. Which is why I added spot lights.
Spotlights only help when you can have your full beam on though.
So a while back I swapped the standard HID bulbs that were in my R56 to some new ones, which I thought would be better.
But first about the standard bulb: For mine they were a Philips XenStart, that have an approximate 4200k in the colour spectrum (e.g. a whitish yellow). The light output on them was not very good and didn't light up much of the side of the road either. This could be because the bulbs haven't been changed before or could have been changed by the previous owner with counterfeit bulbs (which is apparently quite a high chance with Philips bulbs bought on places like ebay).
The second set of bulbs I bought, the ones I thought would be an upgrade from all the info read about them, are MTEC units. After re-checking their details they are actually only OEM spec and it's only the "burners" that were an upgrade.
They are a 6000k in the light spectrum (very white, almost blue colour). While the colour of the light was nicer than the Philips bulbs, I don't think they actually produced any more light. When driving without other cars on the road they seemed fine, but when other cars are on the road it would look like they had switched off. You couldn't see the road at all.
Recently I found out that Osram has brought out an HID bulb for their Night Breaker line. Which if you know anything about halogen bulbs are considered to be some of the best on the market. So I thought I'd give them a go.
When I first turned these on, I thought I had accidentally put the full beam on, they were so bright.
I don't usually believe the crap manufactures put on their packaging, but I feel they actually produce more than the "up to 70% more light". They even light up quite a bit of the left side of the road too, so you can actually see where the side of the road is, even without putting full beam on.
I don't know what the colour rating is, as there doesn't appear to be any documentation on their K rating, but it is a yellow light, but slightly more white than the Philips bulb.
In conclusion: If you've got the HID/Xenon headlights, I highly recommend getting the Osram's. They are making my night time driving much safer.
(sorry I don't have pictures to compare the amount of light they all produce, but I cannot bring myself to change the bulbs three more times to get the pictures, in the dark. As I already installed the Orsam before I took pictures of them you can't have pictures of the bulbs either, just the box
)P.S. People that drive with their fog lights on, when it's not foggy should be forced to try and sleep with a fog light in their face.